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The Proton SDK License (based on the XFree86 1.1 license)

Copyright (C) 2010 Seth A. Robinson All rights reserved.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the “Software”), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicence, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions, and the following disclaimer.

2. The end-user documentation included with the redistribution, if any, must include the following acknowledgment: “This product includes software from the Proton SDK developed by Seth A. Robinson ( www.rtsoft.com )”, in the same place and form as other third-party acknowledgments. Alternately, this acknowledgment can appear in the software itself, in the same form and location as other such third-party acknowledgments.

3. Except as contained in this notice, the name of Seth A. Robinson shall not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the sale, use or other dealings in this Software without prior authorization from Seth A. Robinson.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED 'AS IS' AND ANY EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL SETH A. ROBINSON BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

Note:

Irrlicht engine modifications are released under the Irrlicht ZLIB style license. ( http://irrlicht.sourceforge.net/license.html )

Any source based off ClanLib (located in the shared/Clanlib directory) is released under the current ClanLib license.

Some of the libraries Proton may link to may have additional requirements or restrictions. The Proton SDK license only applies to the Proton SDK source code itself; each of the dependency libraries used in your project includes a license as well, which must be followed.

If you absolutely can't include the one line attribution text somewhere in your about or credits, you can license a “no attribution” version of Proton for a fee. Contact seth@rtsoft.com for more information.

Here is the reasoning:

• A GPL/LGPL license removes the ability to protect and hide your private code and introduces various licensing limitations concerning propriety code that are not helpful especially on mobile platforms.
• If Proton was zlib free, someone would eventually GPL a branch and start adding features to it, which could not be shared with the main distribution which has a much more open license. (This happened with my zlib licensed game Dink Smallwood - I was unable to use community improvements from a GPL'ed version when doing the mobile port, for instance)
• Proton's license is specifically written in such a way that it can't be GPL'ed or effectively branched (possible, but considering the attribution license requirement, unappetizing at best), so there will only be one distribution
• The no attribution license for a fee option allows someone to use Proton in a place where attribution is impossible/undesirable without opening Proton up to the issues of branching mentioned above